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David Bentall probably has more first-hand experience in family business succession than anyone else in the province.

“I was central to three separate family business succession efforts in our family,” said Bentall, grandson of Bentall Group patriarch Charles Bentall. The Bentall Group and its Dominion Construction built many key buildings in Vancouver’s downtown core from 1911 on.

Bentall experienced a traumatic transition in the late 1980s that fractured the powerful family empire and stripped him of a lifelong dream to lead the family business. That was followed by a smooth transition in which he and three siblings bought Dominion Construction and Bentall ran the company which went on to build GM Place. Finally, he worked through a third, smooth transition in which he sold to his sister and brother-in-law in 1998.

One quarter of baby boomer entrepreneurs plan to retire in the next five years, but three quarters of them haven’t started planning succession. More than 70 per cent of family-owned businesses don’t survive the transition from founder to the second generation.

If there’s one thing Bentall, now a family business consultant, has learned from his family’s experiences, it’s that avoiding difficult issues doesn’t work; families need to talk. Avoidance may feel safer, but leads to tragedy. Bentall’s written Leaving a Legacy: Navigating Family Business Succession, a self-published book, to help others avoid the painful mistakes his family lived through.

He explains “how great a business we had, and how it slipped through our fingers.”

The problem? “My dad and my uncle had not learned to talk about who will own the company and run the company in the future. It was as simple as that,” Bentall said. “They tried to avoid topics and smooth them under the rug.”

In the late 1980s, Bentall’s uncle Bob wanted to take the company public and focus on real estate, but Clark, Bentall’s father, wanted to stay private, in construction and real estate, and pass the reins to his son.

“Dad came to believe succession in a family business is the responsibility of the incumbent leader, who has the power and authority to appoint his successor when he is ready to step aside,” Bentall writes in his book. “He also believed succession is an easy decision that takes little forethought or planning. Uncle Bob was left out of the succession discussions completely and probably felt that there might have been a better way of handling things.”

The brothers had no conflict resolution strategies. “Everything blew up in our faces,” said Bentall, now president of Next Step Advisors. The situation deteriorated into “a fractured wasteland of broken relationships,” Bentall said, and ultimately, he was abruptly and painfully ousted from his position as heir apparent.

“We all like to avoid pain,” said Bentall. The first family discussion doesn’t need to be definitive. “Let’s just talk about options. Avoiders are okay to talk about options. They may not want to make decisions.”

Not ready to name a board of directors? “I say, we don’t need a decision now. Why not have a first discussion about what qualities you might like to have in a board?”

Bentall’s uncle had wanted to create an independent board, but his father had resisted. “I wish my dad had seen the value that could have come,” Bentall said. “I think our family could have survived together as co-owners through to the third generation.”

When Bentall’s entrepreneurial grandfather bought Dominion Construction in 1911, he signed an extraordinary vendor-take-back deal in which the interest rate would rise as he paid down the principal. When David’s father Clark started Bentall Centre, he convinced Great West Life to buy the land and lease it back to the Bentalls who lacked the resources to develop the project. But by the time David’s generation came along, resources were no longer a problem.

“By default, I became more of a steward,” Bentall said. “When I went to work for Cadillac Fairview, I learned more about entrepreneurship there. That’s the great benefit of the next generation working outside the family business.”

Purdy’s Chocolates CEO Karen Flavelle would agree. She worked many years outside Purdy’s before succeeding her father, Charles. She considers outside work experience so valuable the Purdy’s family employment policy requires any family member looking to one day lead the company have at least 10 years of external experience plus a business education. Bentall, who tells Flavelle’s story in his book, believes her outside experience gave her the courage to lead a bold expansion into Ontario.

“Entrepreneurs are those who pursue opportunity regardless of whether they have the resources to capture that opportunity,” Bentall said quoting material he read somewhere.

“I was with a family on the weekend,” Bentall said. “The dad said ‘Tell me why I should risk everything I built to let my son take risks? Why should I do that?’ I said ‘You’d be crazy to risk everything you’ve built in order to let your son roll the dice.’ What I encourage families to do is for the elder generation to take the retirement money they need and put it outside the family business so the kids can have the opportunity to run the company and not risk mom and dad’s retirement.”

“I am disappointed my dream didn’t come to be,” Bentall said, “but looking back now, I wouldn’t trade my life for the dream because the opportunity I have to help others is so significant and gratifying to me.”

jennyleevancouversun.com/smallbusiness

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Succession planning: the Bentall family experience

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